Clare Daly (Dublin Fingal, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 9:

In page 8, between lines 7 and 8, to insert the following:“10.The Act of 1997 is amended by the insertion of the following after section 11:

“11A.The Minister shall, within 12 months of the enactment of this Bill, make costed recommendations to Government in regard to providing bail supports in the State, to include but not limited to bail information schemes, bail support/supervision schemes, remand fostering, and bail hostels, with a view to reducing both custodial remand orders and breaches of bail conditions.”.”.

This amendment is identical to Deputy O'Brien's amendment No. 10 and I believe it is key to the whole Bill. It is supposed to be an overhaul of our bail system, but the prospect of doing that without making provision for bail supports would be absolutely ludicrous. It has been highlighted repeatedly by the Irish Penal Reform Trust that this area needs urgent attention. Obviously, as Opposition Deputies we cannot put this directly into the Bill ourselves, and we have been stopped from doing so. The amendment is trying to put the onus on the Minister to make costed recommendations to Government with regard to providing bail supports including, but not limited to, a bail information scheme, bail support and supervision schemes, remand fostering, bail hostels and so on. This is so we can reduce remand orders and breaches of bail conditions.

I would have liked to amend this Bill to factor in all of these measures, which I believe are urgently needed, but I cannot do that. This is my best attempt to do that. I do so from the point of view that the most effective way of improving compliance with bail conditions, particularly in the case of a person who has a chaotic life, is to put in the supports. In deference to the hour, I will not repeat the points made on Committee Stage but there are many examples in other jurisdictions of where re-offending has been cut across, where people have turned up to court in particular in relation to female offenders. It should be remembered that the rate at which women are remanded to custody is much higher than in the case of men and there is a huge cost to society in that regard in terms of the disruption to the family and so on. Putting in place a system of altering bail without the supports to help comply with those conditions will not help that situation. As I said, I will not give the examples of other jurisdictions but they have been key.

I remind Deputies who are more concerned about budgets than the social cost that the financial cost of not getting this right is immense because bail supports save money. On average, there are 520 remand prisoners in prison every day at a cost of approximately €200 per person, which equates to €100,000 per day to house remand prisoners. If we have people out on bail and in receipt of supports and, therefore, not breaking their bail conditions we are saving money and reducing the chance of re-offending. What is proposed in the amendment is the best way to do that. I encourage the Minister to take it on board.

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